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Sunday, September 2, 2007

Decisive Moments

A little tired to get into the whole weekend-slideshow thing tonight, but as I was in bed, reading a Carl Sagan biography, approaching the section on the mid-70's and the run-up to the Voyager missions, several little balloons lifted in my head at once:

2) It seems like the only biographies I really enjoy are those of either scientists or musicians.

An acute illustration of how parents influence their children: when my friend was young, on December 8th, 1980, his mother came into the room, weeping. "Something terrible has happened (or words to that effect)," she sobbed. My friend tensed up, thinking that a close relative had passed away. The moment held, and then the mother said, "John Lennon has been killed!"

The other side of the coin? At some point in 1979, I don't know for sure of the exact date, I was sitting in the living room when my father came in, clearly thrilled. "Jupiter has rings!," he enthused. Sure enough, Voyager 1 had just confirmed a suspicion of two JPL scientists.

In my eternally unfinished screenplay from a few years back, I have two friends who meet as kids, one who is a SETI enthusiast and genuine radio astronomy nut, and the other who is advanced musically for his age and into all things rock. Somehow, they trade life courses, with the radio astronomer dropping all interest in science as he enters his teen years and modeling himself as an indie bandleader type, while the musician - who was technically gifted but without much creative spark or passion for music after a while - ends up studying robotics at MIT.

It never occurred to me for a moment that the entire engine for the script was spun from these childhood moments and the paths they showed to a parents' affection.